Paradigm Shift from pathfinder - Ammunition tracking

[Brandon Tomlinson]

Ammunition tracking seems to be a lot more important in Starfinder. In Pathfinder, you would do all the tracking in increments of 20 for 1 gold piece which would feel like a massive waste of concentration and energy. Now though, cost of refilling batteries and ammo actually scale with the caliber of weapon used. Especially when combined with full auto weapons emptying all remaining charges/rounds, ammo tracking seems to be much more emphasized.

Mostly I'm concerned of inconsistent enforcement. Should I be concerned about being the jerk GM if I ruin someone's day because they didn't carry 5 batteries with them?

And for those that were strict in pathfinder, what methods did you find most efficient for tracking ammo there?

(Newish GM here, looking to get in on the ground floor of Starfinder)

[Andy Brown]

Players must track their ammo (in both PFS & SFS).
GM's should be able to trust players to follow the rules, so you generally don't have to worry about it. However, if a player seems to be doing a lot of shooting without reloading, you might want to give them a gentle reminder, like asking them to remind you how big a magazine their weapon has, or (in a slightly less snarky fashion) making a clear statement of what's happening when one of the bad guys reloads.

Letting somebody get away without tracking ammo isn't being a jerk, it's letting them cheat, and given the additional cost of ammo in SFS it's also letting them unbalance things by spending credits on other stuff.

It's a bit like keeping an eye on Gunslingers in PFS :)

[pedr]

If a Starfinder Inventory Tracking Sheet is still being designed, perhaps a much larger space for batteries than the consumables part of the Pathfinder one would be a good idea. I haven't played PFS recently and hadn't seen the ITS but got one to use for the SFS character I created this weekend, and the bottom section seemed to be the best place to track battery charges, but some characters would tun through sheets very quickly!

[pauljathome]

Andy Brown wrote:

Players must track their ammo (in both PFS & SFS).

In PFS it is such an irrelevant pain that many players don't really do so and most GM's don't care.

I admit that I'm one of the players who don't (not for the bog standard cold iron arrows anyway. Adamantine I track). Every scenario I just spend a few GP (estimating how many arrows I spent, trying to err high). Obviously, my high tier archers have quivers, lots of arrows, etc. With base arrows so cheap its just not worth the effort.

One of my minor concerns with SFS is that tracking will become a pain and make things significantly less fun for little gain.

[Brandon Tomlinson]

I think I'll just be using my dry-erase combat tracker thing, figuring out what size batteries/magazines/etc people use and keep a tally going.

For some of them, they'll also be able to grab rounds/magazines/batteries from enemies.

I see time spent moving small arms cartridges from enemy magazines to player's. And keeping track of how many magazines players started with.

I certainly didn't mean to say that tracking ammo is not in the rules for PFS, but rather the implications of bad discipline are far heavier in Starfinder.

[Woran]

There is a PFS ITS with just boxes. Here

[Michael Hallet]

It mostly only really mattered in PFS for gunslingers. My gunslinger does track his ammo.

My archers just buy more durable arrows than they should ever need for a single encounter so I don't have to bother.

[Hiruma Kai]

I think a related question to ammo tracking, is battery recharging. If a character has a Backup Generator, can they be assumed to recharge all batteries they own between scenarios for free?

Also, given that the core rulebook leaves it up to the GM's discretion whether some larger starships have generator stations you can plug your devices into for free, is it up to the GM at the table to determine if there are usable generators on the Master of Stars, for example? Or even on the Drake or Pegasus? Or if nothing is mentioned, is the GM to assume they do not exist?

[Brandon Tomlinson]

Oh right, I forgot about the backup generator. And can you recharge batteries in session if you're travelling for multiple days? maybe even recharge allies batteries.